Frankly, I’m pooped after that freezer ordeal!
Well, sorry about last night’s shorty blog, but finding all the freezer stuff in puddles was NOT fun.
Fortunately, there are those of you out there who leave such nice COMMENTS (like those guys at http://jansfunnyfarm.blogspot.com/) that make me feel a whole lot better than when I saw that light off. All is back to normal, but mama refused to cut up the 4-kilo roast that thawed out and then give it to me in tiny pieces for dinner.
Hey, you can only try, right?
Now to get back to the ravioli with butter and sage. Here are the first steps:
First you make the dough in a food processor–2 cups flour, a little salt, 2 eggs and just enough warm water to make a CRUMBLY dough, NOT a smooth one. It should never stick to your paws, never.
Form the dough into little flat round cakes about the width of your hand. Dust with flour.
Start on the widest opening of your pasta machine, and start putting the little flat cakes through twice. Each time one comes out, fold each end into the middle to make it more squared off. This will make your dough squarish and easy to cut into noodles or ravioli.
Now put your pasta opening to the middle size and start rolling out the dough you have folded, starting with the open side of the fold, not the folded side. Put the sheets, separated and laid on a floured surface or marble or granite, through the machine again, using the next-to-last opening, NOT the last. The next-to-last makes a nice, chewy ravioli dough, while the last opening will often make the dough too thin and it will tear, but if you are careful, you can use the last opening, make the ravioli very carefully without tearing the dough, and then lay them aside on a towel dusted with flour until you boil them.
Lay teaspoons full of the filling you are using on the dough, sort of to one side but leaving enough to flip over and seal the filling in the pasta. This is the lazy-kitty’s way of making ravioli because you only have to cut one side, not two. For special ravioli guests, mama lays another sheet over the filling sheet underneath and then seals two sides instead of one to have a nice design all the way around the raviolo.
With your fingers and a little water, moisten the edge of the filling sheet, and then flip the dough over the filling, making the edges meet, Press the dough between the filling bumps with your fingers to push out any air that is trapped, and then press all around the filling bump, sealing the edge you have moistened, too.
With a ravioli cutter, cut along the long side of the pasta and then between the bumps to make the ravioli. Some may have a little more pasta dough around them and you can fix that with a new cut, if you like.
Cut between the bumps (see bumps above)
And eureka–here are your ravioli ready for melted butter and toasted sage leaves!! (I only like the butter part, but the ricotta is nice, too, as I mentioned before.)
The filling mama uses is pretty simple: cooked spinach or kale or Swiss chard, really, really drained to almost dry!!! Add 1 small carton of ricotta to 1 cup of drained greens, a pinch of nutmeg, a tablespoon of parmesan and an egg yolk. Miss all together to make your bumps.
This is just about one of the most delicious foods on earth if you have fresh sage and good cottage cheese or ricotta, but I saw mama use a cheese spread that she had made with four cheeses (too much left over cheese goes into spreads so it doesn’t sit out and rot!) and she put that in her bumps and boy it was good–fresh tomato sauce over that one. And even I have tomatoes in my Purina Felix food!!! Tomatoes are really good for men things, and of course, being a female kitty, I don’t have to worry, but they are also really good for your inner workings!
Plus, I’m a little hot tomato, myself…haha.
I mean, does this say “come hither”, or what!
